The arrival of incoming short message service (SMS) messages to a mobile phone can be signaled to the user playing an alert, such as a tone or tone sequence, vibrating the handset, and so forth. The settings for these alerts may be controlled by the central service provider or the user. Unfortunately, these alerts may not distinguish different incoming SMS messages in terms of their relative importance to the user.
Thus, there is a need for a method and system that distinguishes different incoming SMS messages in terms of their relative importance to the user.